Confessions of a Laugh Addict

It's true -- I am addicted to laughs. But to the old fashioned kind.

Hi. Welcome to Laughaholics Anonymous. My name is Melanie and I nearly died laughing. This program taught me balance and moderation, cuz baby, there was a time I was a hardcore humor junkie.

I started small, real small. My cradle. It was way too easy. I was sobbing fitfully in little crybaby gasps over some minor diaper issue, Mom squeezed my rubber ducky, it went "squeak, squeak!" my gasps turned to giggles and I was gone, man. An innocent kid, hooked for life. Sob to giggle is a very, very short step, having to do with the simple replacement of an inhalation with an exhalation. It was way too easy. Thereafter, I started seeking fixes from wherever I could get ‘em.

It wasn't hard in a Jewish household. My family, like so many of our brethren from the Old World, endured their historic lack of popularity by ridiculing themselves. "If you can't beat em, join em," seemed to be the prevailing wisdom.

My family, like so many of our brethren from the Old World, endured their historic lack of popularity by ridiculing themselves.

"I'm so fat that when I sit around the house, I sit AROOUUUNUND THE HOUSE!" my uncle would kvell. "No, I don't have a head on my shoulders -- my neck is just blowing bubbles," my cousin would whine. Killed us! These outbursts of addictive humor were especially common at mealtimes, where spewed food appearing on other faces, or beverages fountaining up and out the nostrils only heightened the hilarity further.

It was the family problem. All the neighbors knew. Hearing the uproarious laughter booming out of our house late into the night, they clucked their tongues and called us shameless behind our backs....which made us laugh even more! Maybe we weren't the richest family in town, but we had a darn good time!

When I matured and left home, I found it hard to function in the humorlessly real world of the late 60's. The Vietnam War, the incident at Kent State. That stuff wasn't very funny. For a while there seemed to be a laughter shortage. We started a humor conservation club. Friends and I would gather and tell a precious joke in a small room so as not to waste any. We'd inhale each other's laughs, recycle 'em and laugh again. I started going to some mighty tough areas to get laughs, too -- dinner theaters, nightclubs, nice Jewish guys' mothers' apartments. I'll admit it -- I was lured by a few giggles into some not so funny situations.

When I tried to be a stand up comic myself, I was never satisfied with mere chortles, chuckles, titters or guffaws. I was hungry for the big stuff, the good stuff. I wanted boffo, pants-splitting, weep-reaping, soda-spitting, fall flat on the floor funny. I felt a failure for the mere amusement I provided. I knew I didn't have it to be a big time laugh peddler.

Now I watch addicts at the local clubs, at the Comedy Central tapings, so desperate for laughter that they think they can jump start it by ‘hooting" at an off color comedian. They all need a good squeeze toy, in my opinion. Poor things have forgotten how to laugh.

In this era which lacks a sense of humor, real laughter is hard to get. We need our limited air for other things like breathing. Hence the advent of the "dramedy" on television. But, c'mon. how can shows "Ally McBeal," or "Desperate Housewives" (and I've acted on them so I know) be nominated for Emmys for best comedies? Hah! Don't make me laugh. People are so starved for humor that they mistake over the top attention getting for funny. But do you really laugh aloud watching "Ugly Betty?" Just listen to yourselves! Sitting in your parlors alone, does one itsy bitsy snicker or drop of spittle emit from your laughing mouth? I think not!

So, just as the world is making it difficult for smokers to maintain their habit, the laugh habit is something I'm having to control. "No laughing!" signs, with the X through the smiling mouth are pervasive. I sublimate with socially appropriate pacifiers like sugarless gum, tongue texting, and, in the privacy of my home, thumb sucking, but they all have side effects and costs. I feel cheap, degenerate, ashamed. They will just never be the same high as sheer mirth.

I know I'm being radically unorthodox here, but I feel when times are tough we all deserve a hearty laugh. Let's agree to meet in speakeasy, laugheasy places like this one and tell a few from time to time, okay?

Laughter is still the best addiction and the best medicine a person could have, with no side effects...except the occasional stains and spills.

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About the Author

MELANIE CHARTOFF considers herself an inventor – of stories and characters for the page, stage and screen, including roles she''s created on ABC''s late night comedy answer to SNL, "Friday''s," "Parker Lewis Can''t Lose," "The Newhart Show," "Wiseguy," "Ally McBeal," "Touched by an Angel," and "Desperate Housewives." She can be heard daily as the voices of Didi and Minka on Nickleodeon''s long-running "Rugrats" and its spin-off "All Grown Up." For more information about Melanie, you can visit her website at http://melaniechartoff.com

The opinions expressed in the comment section are the personal views of the commenters. Comments are moderated, so please keep it civil.

Visitor Comments: 3

(3)
kathee,
November 20, 2007 9:39 AM

I miss decent humor

I enjoyed your article very much. I have been disappointed and often disgusted with what goes for "humor" in recent years. And, it's getting more crude by the year. The fact that old shows with more honest, non-crude humor have endured and continue to entertain even the current generation should speak volumes to the entertainment industry. Alas, they don't appear to be listening to the laughter.

(2)
Gjary Katz,
October 16, 2007 3:35 PM

I miss some of the old funny shows

"Ugly Betty" is ok, but I miss the older shows, like "Seinfeld," "Taxi," "WKRP in Cincinatti." I remember loving "Laugh-In," although it seems hopelessly dated now. One mark of a great comedy is that lines from the show become part of our culture. Whether it's Don Adams' "Missed it by that much," or Seinfeld's "Master of my domain," good comedy sticks to our ribs. Think of all the jokes you've heard and told over your life. Each one of those jokes was invented by someone at some time. Kind of cool to think up a joke and know that thousands of people will repeat it for years and years. Depending on the joke, generations. Look at the Three Stooges. Not for everyone, but they're still making people laugh all over the world. Laughter endures.

(1)
babs,
October 15, 2007 12:16 PM

I think they're funny

well, yes, I laugh out loud at Ugly Betty, Everybody Hates Chris, Reaper. and Pushing Daisies. I think the writer is a bit hyper critical. Don't quantify your laughs - loosen up! i have some very funny dogs here. Find enjoyment! A laugh is great and a smile is fine if that's what going.

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I've been striving to get more into spirituality. But it seems that every time I make some progress, I find myself slipping right back to where I started. I'm getting discouraged and feel like a failure. Can you help?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Spiritual slumps are a natural part of spiritual growth. There is a cycle that people go through when at times they feel closer to God and at times more distant. In the words of the Kabbalists, it is "two steps forward and one step back." So although you feel you are slipping, know that this is a natural process. The main thing is to look at your overall progress (over months or years) and be able to see how far you've come!

This is actually God's ingenious way of motivating us further. The sages compare this to teaching a baby how to walk. When the parent is holding on, the baby shrieks with delight and is under the illusion that he knows how to walk. Yet suddenly, when the parent lets go, the child panics, wobbles and may even fall.

At such times when we feel spiritually "down," that is often because God is letting go, giving us the great gift of independence. In some ways, these are the times when we can actually grow the most. For if we can move ourselves just a little bit forward, we truly acquire a level of sanctity that is ours forever.

Here is a practical tool to help pull you out of the doldrums. The Sefer HaChinuch speaks about a great principle in spiritual growth: "The external awakens the internal." This means that although we may not experience immediate feelings of closeness to God, eventually, by continuing to conduct ourselves in such a manner, this physical behavior will have an impact on our spiritual selves and will help us succeed. (A similar idea is discussed by psychologists who say: "Smile and you will feel happy.")

That is the power of Torah commandments. Even if we may not feel like giving charity or praying at this particular moment, by having a "mitzvah" obligation to do so, we are in a framework to become inspired. At that point we can infuse that act of charity or prayer with all the meaning and lift it can provide. But if we'd wait until being inspired, we might be waiting a very long time.

May the Almighty bless you with the clarity to see your progress, and may you do so with joy.

In 1940, a boatload 1,600 Jewish immigrants fleeing Hitler's ovens was denied entry into the port of Haifa; the British deported them to the island of Mauritius. At the time, the British had acceded to Arab demands and restricted Jewish immigration into Palestine. The urgent plight of European Jewry generated an "illegal" immigration movement, but the British were vigilant in denying entry. Some ships, such as the Struma, sunk and their hundreds of passengers killed.

If you seize too much, you are left with nothing. If you take less, you may retain it (Rosh Hashanah 4b).

Sometimes our appetites are insatiable; more accurately, we act as though they were insatiable. The Midrash states that a person may never be satisfied. "If he has one hundred, he wants two hundred. If he gets two hundred, he wants four hundred" (Koheles Rabbah 1:34). How often have we seen people whose insatiable desire for material wealth resulted in their losing everything, much like the gambler whose constant urge to win results in total loss.

People's bodies are finite, and their actual needs are limited. The endless pursuit for more wealth than they can use is nothing more than an elusive belief that they can live forever (Psalms 49:10).

The one part of us which is indeed infinite is our neshamah (soul), which, being of Divine origin, can crave and achieve infinity and eternity, and such craving is characteristic of spiritual growth.

How strange that we tend to give the body much more than it can possibly handle, and the neshamah so much less than it needs!